Himalaya

Day 51: Dovan to Derali

The scenery change is equally dramatic. After 24 hours of sometimes oppressive forest, the valley now opens and widens out and for the first time I have a sense of the monumental scale of what we are heading into. The 40-mile-long wall that stretches from Annapurna I in the west to Annapurna II in the east has no less than nine summits above 23,000 feet (7010 m). Even closer to us are Annapurna South at 23,678 feet (7200 m), Hiunchuli, over 21,000 feet (6400 m) and, barely five miles due east, the mesmerically eye-catching Machhapuchhre, the highest of its two pinnacles rising just short of 23,000 feet (7010 m).

This is sublime mountain scenery. Only Concordia in Pakistan, on the threshold of K2, reduced me to the same sense of inarticulate wonder.

Not much time for wonder, inarticulate or otherwise, as we have to keep moving, stopping, filming, moving and eventual stopping for a more substantial breather beneath a soaring overhang called the Hinko Rocks.

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PALIN'S GUIDES

Series: Himalaya
Chapter: Day 51: Dovan to Derali
Country/sea: Nepal
Place: Dovan
Book page no: 115

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Leh - Yangbajing